


Casual Affair

by scarletrebel



Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-23
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-25 15:22:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17123855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scarletrebel/pseuds/scarletrebel
Summary: “Oh, sweetheart, you have no idea what this is, do you?” A wicked smile curls up Rook’s face as he lowers his own gun, taking a few steps forward.“Shut up.” Avia spits back.“Nah, I’d rather tell you all about how you’ve got a Guardian killer in your hands there. One the Vanguard keep around for god knows what reason.” He inches closer, and Avia steps forward to meet him. His hands come up in mock surrender, and she ignores how her stomach curls at his easy smile. It’s infuriating, to some degree.“The only Guardian killer I see is you,” she starts. “Go. Now.”“Or else what?” He asks. He moves forward once again, and Avia misses the time in between him feeling a mile away and being pressed up against the Thorn. She can practically feel his heartbeat through the gun.





	1. Everything Black

**Author's Note:**

> in keeping with my tradition of bad!au's at christmas time, merry christmas ya'll! 
> 
> I wrote this in a frenzy (much like of madness and truth last year) and since i havent uploaded much this year due to commisions and Personal Stuff, I wanted to get this up before the end of the year! 
> 
> as per usual, rook belongs to my good buddy (who for some reason lets me continuously torture their kids) mrpinstripesuit, avia is my Problem Child, and the rest is dramatic, angsty history. enjoy!

_[u.1:2.4] You cannot have him._

_[u.2:2.7] You fear for his Light?_

_[u.1:2.5] He..._

_[u.2:2.8] ...is special._

_[u.1:2.6] Yes._

_[u.2:2.9] I am aware._

_[u.1:2.7] You’re trying to tempt him. You’re feeding his anger._

_[u.2:3.0] The gun is a memento, nothing more._

_[u.1:2.8] You claim to be a vessel, a hollow shell where once a man stood, but that is just a lie. The man is still in you._

_[u.2:3.1] There is no man here, I am now, and for the rest of time, only Dredgen Yor._

_\- Ghost Fragment: Thorn 4_

* * *

When Ikora calls her to the Hall of Guardians, Avia is expecting Cayde’s presence too. Her Hunter Vanguard will do all he can to remind her of her class, even butting into any mission briefings she has with other members of the Vanguard, be it with a quip or his own ‘specific expertise’.

So it comes as a shock to see him not present at the table when she walks in. Her footfalls are soft and quiet, even so Ikora senses her approach and turns to greet her. Avia casts a glance over her shoulder at Zavala at the opposite end of the room.

“Don’t tell me you finally let Cayde out of the Tower?”

Zavala throws her a grim look, mouth set into a line and Avia meets it with a morbid confusion.

“What’s his problem?” The Awoken asks Ikora, whose face is set in an equally grim measure.

“Cayde left for what he _called_ a brief scouting mission,” Ikora starts, reaching down to her holopad, and from its screen rises a map of an area of Earth Avia has never seen before. “This is the European Dead Zone. It’s highly off limits to Guardians.”

“Except Cayde?”

The comment pulls a small smile from Ikora’s lips. “Would it surprise you if I told you that this isn’t where he told us he was going?”

“Of course not,” Avia sighs. “And let me guess, he’s in over his head?”

“There’s no doubt,” Ikora confirms. “But, there’s more you should know.”

Avia watches the images cycle in front of her. A giant cascading shard towers over a forest, decrepit buildings rusted and decaying sit in its shadow. Lightning bounces within the layers of the construct, storm clouds gathering around it.

“Looks suitably ominous.” Avia mutters.

“This is a shard of the Traveler, cast off from the Collapse. The Light and Dark fluctuate in its presence.” 

“Making that forest a deathtrap?”

“Avia,” Ikora simmers. Avia’s come to notice this in the Warlock Vanguard, when something is wrong and pressing up against the carefully constructed walls of her mind. But, she must remain calm and composed in the face of it all. Avia recognises it well, a quiet storm betrayed by only the smallest of movements.

Ikora’s hands come down onto the table, her fingers trembling. “Cayde left two days ago. He hasn’t returned.”

Avia allows her mind to wander as Ikora’s words hit her. Cayde, bold and brass finding his way through this forest as easy as walking through the Tower. Enemies of the Light crowding him, surrounding him, and whilst he doesn’t go down without a fight it’s that one mistake that could cost him.

“You want me to find him.”

Ikora thins her lips into a line, looking from the holopad and down to Zavala. Avia misses the minute way they communicate to each other, and when Ikora turns to her she can tell the Warlock is somehow sadder.

“Bring him home, however that may be.”

* * *

 She has to receive the highest clearance from Zavala, Ikora, and the Speaker in order to fly into the Dead Zone. Zavala advised her to touch down outside of the forest and make her way in. His monotone suggestion didn’t exactly inspire confidence, and it left her riddled with annoyance that she couldn’t shake.

Her ship flies low until those same rusted buildings come into view. She picks a cliff edge and stops above it, hitting a button on the console to materialise below. She waits for the ship to pull away before moving. But still, something feels wrong.

“Levi?” She calls for her Ghost, and they appear at her shoulder with a whirl.

“I know you’re worried,” they say. “Are you afraid?

Avia scoffs, light hearted, and takes her sniper rifle off her back. “”No. I just… Feel like I’m not getting the full picture.”

“How do you mean?” They ask as Avia raises her arms and looks down the scope of her rifle. She spots the forest a breath away, the trees thick and coarse, a fog clinging to the bark and making it hard to see anything further inwards from here. Still, there’s no present hostiles as she scans the horizon, and answers her Ghost.  

“There’s something Ikora wasn’t telling me.”

“You always think that,” Levi floats in front of her scope, making her lower it with a sigh.

“No, I always think that about Zavala. Not Ikora.”

“She has no reason to lie to you.”

“Lying by omission is still lying.” Avia says.

“You’re not in the Reef anymore.” Levi’s voice is soft, a comfort.

She mutters under her breath. “Hard to tell sometimes.”

She starts to walk, taking a leap at the edge of the cliff and landing heavily at the bottom of it. She walks towards the buildings, a language she doesn’t know etched officially along the sides, peeling where the corrugated metal dips inwards. The air is still and quiet. As she climbs the structure, jumping over destroyed staircases and navigating the outcroppings to reach the roof, the echo of her movements through the dead air sets her on edge.

“What was Cayde scouting?” She wonders aloud. Levi hesitates next to her. Then he whirls his shell once, twice, and answers.

“I think… ‘Scouting’ might have been a loose term for what he was doing out here.”

Avia smiles under her helmet. “Sounds about right.”

“The language in his reports, if you could even call them that, before he went missing suggest that he was looking for something specific.”

“Like what?” Avia asks, pulling herself up into an empty room. She sees the thick trees through a small slit where one wall has collapsed onto another, and shimmies through the gap. She jumps down and out of the building on the other side, jumping again to cushion the landing. At the precipice, she pushes into the forest.

“Something he lost, I think.” Levi says. They dematerialise then, retreating into the relative safety of her helmet.

Avia hums, sticking close to the trees as the fog seeps under her armour, cloying at her skin. She tries to watch and be careful of the way her feet brush against the dead leaves and twigs on the ground. It’s not an environment she’s used to for stealth, but the same rules apply – stay close to the ground, and keep your eyes open.

“The second you detect anything, let me know.” She tells Levi.

“Aside from the insurmountable Darkness surrounding us alongside a general feeling of dread?” Levi asks, to which Avia gives a small laugh. “Can do.”

* * *

 He was dangerously close to growing bored.

He sits with his back to the wall, flicking a knife up and down. He watches the way the dingy orange lights bounce off the sharp metal as it twists through the air, his wrist loose. The Dredgens chatter around him, keeping to themselves mostly. He still didn’t understand what they wanted from him, what they expected from an exiled Guardian.

He’d told them as much, gave them what they asked for – well, as much as he could be bothered. Still, they followed. And still, he didn’t know how he felt about it.

Some of their Ghosts pitter around their heads, cowardly, having conversations they don’t want him to hear. One such catches his eye, and it shakes itself from looking at its Guardian, and dissipates quickly. The Hunter it belongs to casts a glance over her shoulder, her legs crossed on the cave floor a few feet away from him.

She locks eyes with him, stilling a hand in the book she was flicking through, the scattered pieces of the scout rifle she’s trying to infuse into the Darkness around her feet.

“What?” He spits. The Guardian doesn’t cower, just tries to hide her smile as she begins to draw something in the soil between them.

“My Ghost thinks you’re dangerous.”

“Does your Ghost like pointing out the obvious?” He replies. The Hunter only continues her vicious smirk, a sandy blonde piece of hair falling from its ponytail as she leans between them and traces a pattern in the dirt. It takes longer than he’d like to admit to recognise it as something Hive.

“Don’t all Ghosts?” She asks, placing the main skeleton of her gun over the rune, speaking as she draws an intricate circle around it. “She doesn’t get it though. She thinks we’re turning to the Dark, as if we don’t need the Light. I keep trying to tell her; the Light makes us blind, but I don’t think it’s our enemy either.”

“Aint that poetic.”

The Hunter gives him her own scathing look, but it’s laced in mirth, and it cracks the electric in his skull – the way she looks at him like she knows something he doesn’t. First Curse sits heavy on his hip, but the Guardian starts talking again.

“You don’t want to lead us,” she starts. He stills his motions with the knife, catching it blade side, the metal biting into his skin. “You could kill every Guardian in here if you wanted to.”

He looks at the Guardians around them who have started to listen in. They’re not as bold, refusing to meet his eyes.

“But you haven’t, because no matter what the Vanguard, or any Ghost says, you’re not him. You’re different. I guess if I was really trying to be poetic, I’d say there’s a way to follow the Dark without losing the Light.”

The Guardian mutters something under her breath, and they both watch the runes on the floor glow a sickly green, a plume of smoke rising to entwine itself in the metal above it. The others around them stare. When the spell finishes, the exo skeleton breathes with that same sickly energy, something black like ichor peeling off of it.

“And what? You think that’s me?”

She picks the gun up, a finger around the trigger.

“I guess that’s up to you.”

Before he can respond, a Warlock peels around the corner harried, breathing hard.

“He’s gone.”

“What?” He asks, a quiet intensity in the way he tenses but doesn’t move.

The Warlock stutters, tries to find his voice. “He overpowered us. His Ghost did something, got herself out of her cage and then freed him. We couldn’t fight him off–”

He flings the knife between the Warlocks feet, a centimetre away from his foot. It stops the Guardian with a small gasp. He stands and takes the hand canon off his hip, once laced in fine silver and now dark and peeling at the edges. With his fury it starts to feel warm in his hands, putting the scout rifle below him to shame. The Hunter looks at it in awe, seeing similar yet impossibly different runes to the ones she used carved on the sides. He misses the hunger in her eyes.

“Tell me which way he went and then get the hell out of here. Everyone.”

The Hunter pipes up from the floor as he walks towards the mouth of the cave system. “And then what? How will we find you?”

He doesn’t look back as he answers. “I guess that’s up to you.”

* * *

 “I don’t like this.”

“You’ve said that five times already, Levi.” Avia says, though her voice betrays her own unease.

They’ve been walking for what feels like hours. As they traversed deeper, the forest became darker, blocking out all sunlight. Levi told her a ways back that the influence of the shard was heaviest here, but what Avia didn’t mention was the solar flames beneath her skin, an ache to act. Something was coming, her gut felt out of sorts.

“Actually,” she starts. “I don’t like this either.”

Levi materialises. “Zavala said there was no shame in turning back.”

“No. I’m going to find him.” Avia breathes in, out. “I just don’t understand what he was doing here.”

“I still think he was looking for something,” Levi repeats.

Avia hums. She notices a break in the trees, a vague notion of movement previously through a clearing. As she inches closer, she sees faint boot prints in the mud, a casual walk. Levi is one step ahead, and scans the area.

“There were… Well, there might have been Guardians through here,” they say, frustrated. “It’s so difficult to tell. There’s too much Light to be able to detect anything friendly, and too much Dark to detect anything at all.”

“There was someone here,” Avia starts. She inches closer to a fallen tree, notices scorches in the bark, like something burnt it. She looks around some more, a couple of trees over her shoulder bear bullet holes.

Levi floats towards them, scanning yet again. Avia bristles, hearing something, a steady but quick footfall some ways away.

“Avia, these bullet holes, they’re–”

“Shh.” She whispers. Levi floats back down to her as bullets ring the air. Ace of Spades. Avia leaps over the tree trunk and runs towards the noise.

She skids this way and that, trying to keep up with the rumble. Between the thicket she watches two figures race past, one undoubtedly Cayde, the other head to toe in black. She stops, skidding to a halt, and follows their path adjacent, keeping to the trees so she isn’t spotted.

She hears two shots, the way they ring through the air all too familiar. Not Ace of Spades, something else and it makes that fire under her skin scorch. Cayde yells, goes down, and the person wielding Thorn catches up to him.

She rests behind the trunk of a large tree, looking into a circular clearing. Her Vanguard lies on his side, his Ghost fussing over him tirelessly. She watches his pursuer move closer, black armour from head to toe, and sees that his gun isn’t the hand canon she wields. No, it’s similar in nature, but corrupted in a completely different way.

“Is that a Guardian?” She whispers, as the man in question stalks lazily over to where Cayde rights himself onto his back – he’s hurt, his Exo plating damaged beyond recognition.

“No,” Levi answers. “At least, I don’t think so.”

“Aint this a little too – _ahh, god_ – easy for you?” Cayde asks the stranger, pulling his Ghost to his chest. She gets the message and disappears as the man stands over him.

“Says the one making it easy,” he says, pulling his helmet off. Ebony hair falls out around his shoulders, dark brown eyes boring holes into the exo below him. Avia holds a breath. He’s human, but there’s something about him that isn’t. “I really thought you’d at least be a challenge.”

“I was about to say the same for you,” Cayde spits back. There’s a venom that Avia can’t place. “Thought finding you would be a whole lot harder.”

“And why even try to?” The man asks, kneeling down, regarding Cayde like he’s playing with his food. “Trying to save my sorry soul?”

“Well, that’s real dramatic of you Rook, maybe those Dredgens have finally – _ahh!_ ”  

The man, whose name is apparently Rook, fires a round into Cayde’s chest.

Levi pipes up, their voice small and strained next to Avia. “He’s running on auxiliary power already Avia, we have to get in there.”

“Wait,” she finds herself saying.

Cayde coughs and splutters, the machines where his lungs would be whirring in protest. “I’m sorry,” he breathes.

Rook tilts his head. “That doesn’t change anything.”

“Oh, I know,” Cayde goes on. “But we _both_ know that you don’t – you don’t want to be this.”

Rook stands, aiming his gun down and Avia sees the sightline – right between Cayde’s eyes.

“It’s too late to give me that choice.”

Avia breaks her cover then, summoning her Golden Gun, and using the first blast to knock the gun from Rook’s hand. The Darkness around it absorbs the blast but knocks it off centre, and his eyes find her immediately. She aims the second for his chest, which causes him to stutter back, and she takes the opening to run forward and place herself over Cayde.

The man in black rights himself and they aim their guns at each other, Avia still engulfed in solar flame as something darker roils off of Rook’s body. When her Light runs its course, the flames make way for the Thorn in her hand to make itself known.

Rook looks her in the eyes, down to the gun in her hand, and then laughs.

“Oh you are a bunch of hypocrites, aren’t you Cayde?”

“Get out of here,” Avia warns. Levi scans Cayde’s body, coaxing his own Ghost forward so they can make enough repairs to keep Cayde stable for now. “Last chance.”

“Oh, sweetheart, you have no idea what this is, do you?” A wicked smile curls up Rook’s face as he lowers his own gun, taking a few steps forward.

“Shut up.” Avia spits back.

“Nah, I’d rather tell you all about how you’ve got a Guardian killer in your hands there. One the Vanguard keep around for god knows what reason.” He inches closer, and Avia steps forward to meet him. His hands come up in mock surrender, and she ignores how her stomach curls at his easy smile. It’s infuriating, to some degree.

“The only Guardian killer I see is you,” she starts. “Go. Now.”

“Or else what?” He asks. He moves forward once again, and Avia misses the time in between him feeling a mile away and being pressed up against the Thorn. She can practically feel his heartbeat through the gun.

Thank the Traveler she’s wearing her helmet.

“Avia,” Cayde rasps below her. He sounds better, and she hears the soft dissipation of a Ghost that must be his. “Don’t do anything stupid.”

“That is rich coming from you.” She mutters, and the man in front of her has the audacity to laugh as if they’ve known each other for years.

“Avia,” he says, his eyes raking down her body. “Pretty name.”

“I am _seconds_ away from putting you down for good.” She bites back. He smiles at her reaction and it sends a wave of embarrassment through her.

“But you won’t. Killing Guardians is bad, remember?” Sarcasm drips from his words.

“You’re not a Guardian.”

Rook’s face falls, impassive and unreadable as the darkness rolls off him, still steady.

In a flash he grabs Avias wrist and places the Thorn underneath his chin, his other hand on her waist as he looks at her and says; “I’m the same kinda Guardian that you are, sweetheart.”

She’s caught off guard, a steady and aggravating heat pooling in her chest. She doesn’t realise when his finger curls around hers on the trigger, squeezing it.

She pulls back as quick as she can, the bullet sounding off between them. She makes to reach for a knife, throw it at his chest and make some space but then she’s back on her ship, Cayde breathing, the sound a steady static on the floor below her.

Levi whirls in front of her; “Are you alright?”

“I…” She starts, shaking herself and taking her helmet off. Cayde groans behind her, and she turns and kneels at his side.

“Nice one, hot shot.” He grits out. Avia rolls her eyes, hooking an arm around his back and moving him into the co-pilot chair.

“You’ve got a lot of explaining to do,” she says, tone fierce.

“Aw come on, I’m sure I’ll get enough of that from the big guy,” Cayde whines, clutching his chest as though some parts will fall out of him.

Avia ignores the protest. “You can starts with who he is.”

“That’s a long story.”

Avia sets a course for the Tower, plotting the longest route she can find without raising suspicion.

“You’ve got time.”

* * *

 Cayde told her a story, in his typical Cayde fashion.

One of a Hunter who didn’t know where he belonged, who made a mistake and questioned everything after that.

The Exo tried to throw in a joke here and there, but the damage to his body made all of them land flat.

He apologised to Avia. She didn’t know what for.

Pulling her ship into the bay, Cayde’s Ghost transported him to the hospital. Zavala called her to the hall, and she took a few seconds to take in everything.

From Zavala, an explanation she expected, one of an exiled Guardian was definitely at the back of her mind. But what Zavala tells her forces her to take a deep breath, her grip on the table between them tightening.

“The next Dredgen Yor? Are you kidding me?” She seethes in his direction. The Titan commander clenches his fist in response.

“It’s disappointing to see you not taking this seriously,” Zavala starts, his gaze stark and cold. “This man kidnapped and nearly killed your Vanguard.”

“Yeah, the kidnapped part you left out,” Avia replies harshly, and Ikora reacts in the most miniscule way next to her. “You knew he was there, and you didn’t even mention him to me.”

“Avia,” Ikora’s voice is a gentle wave in the storm of Avia’s mind. “You must understand how much of a threat this man is. We’d assumed Cayde was dead.”

“And we trusted you not to put yourself in unnecessary danger in order to get him back.”

“Oh, you trusted me?” Avia’s voice is venom at Zavala’s addition. “You’ve got a really funny way of showing it.”

Ikora lays a hand over her own. “His patterns are chaotic, unpredictable. This is the most activity we’ve seen in some time. Plainly, we didn’t know if Rook was a threat.”

“Was that the Vanguards excuse with Dredgen, too?” Avia asks. “If he’s a Guardian killer, then he’s always a threat.” She takes the Thorn off her hip and slams it down. With a horrid screech, she pushes it, giving enough momentum so that it slides to a stop in front of Zavala. The jagged edges leave white marks on the table. Zavala stares at it, then back up to Avia.

She goes on; “Although I guess if you let Guardians run around with weapons like these, you must have your priorities mixed up.”

Zavala picks the gun up, studies it for a second. “These are replicas,” he puts it down gently, sliding it back to her, the sound less intrusive this time, and those staring at them go back to their work. “Nothing more.”

“You don’t think it represents something?” Avia asks, putting it back on her hip without even casting it a glance. “You don’t think it glorifies a man who you, _the Vanguard_ , refuse to even discuss?”

“He’s dead. There’s nothing to discuss.”

Avia huffs, and feels Ikora squeeze her hand gently.

“You saved Cayde, Avia.” The Warlock says, soft and gentle and Avia looks down at their hands and frowns. Above the wrist of her gauntlet there’s a tear, a quick slash of the material.

“Barely,” she adds. She thinks of Rook’s hand around her wrist, the feel of Thorn shooting a poisoned bullet between them, his crooked grin insisting at her naivety. It sends a shot of anger through her, and she rears up at Zavala once more.

“I want as much information on him as possible.”

“No.”

“If he kidnapped Cayde, who’s to say he won’t do it again?” Avia starts, her voice more confident than she expected. “If you’re not even going to issue a warning about him, then I at least want to be the one able to explain to the fireteam of Guardians _you_ let die what happened – because it’s not common knowledge that there’s a Guardian killer running around.”

Zavala stills, deathly so, and before he can open his mouth Ikora speaks with a measured voice – one not to be argued with.

“We noticed a shift in his behaviour with the Crucible,” she starts. “I’ll send you everything that should help, should you come across him again. But, Avia. That is not permission to seek him out.”

_It’s too late to give me that choice_ , Rooks’ voice echoes in her head.

“Then you should hope he doesn’t give me a reason to.”

* * *

 Rooks’ walk back to the cave is slow. He plays with a piece of scrap fabric in his hand. It’s a decent material, stronger than his own, most likely on account of how old his armour is.

He ripped it from her gauntlet. It wasn’t his intent, really, he’d forgotten how bad the kickback on Thorn can be. His grip on her wrist was tighter than expected, the one on her waist meant to set her on edge. The material is a dark blue, and he splays it across his palm. It’s just dark enough to not be seen against his own.

Staring at it he slows even more. Just short of coming to a stop, he pulls at the collar of his cloak and ties the strip of fabric around it.

If anything, he’s giving the Dredgens a good chance to move it or lose it. A thought comes to him as he resumes a steady pace; he wonders how they’d react, if he killed one of their own. If it’d change anything. It’s an interesting idea to him, at least.

He reaches the mouth of the cave and stops. He doesn’t hear anything, just the gentle buzz of the night. He pushes in more, wanting to be sure, wondering how much these Dredgens follow his word. As he traverses further, he’s sure no one is here.

“Rook,” a voice says, one he hasn’t heard in some time. “You have to stop this.”

He doesn’t look at Saffron, even though the Ghost keeps herself hovered in his peripheral.

“You’ve crossed a line now,” she starts, and Rook only laughs, the sound echoing around them.

“Think I crossed a line a while back,” he states, and Saffron doesn’t have it in her to even whirl her shell.

“You know the Vanguard will see you as a direct threat after this.”

“The Vanguard don’t know and won’t do anything,” he bites back. “They never do.”

They walk past the makeshift Hive trap the Dredgens constructed for Cayde. Rook walks steadily past it, a look of disdain on his face.

“You know what these… _Guardians_ want from you,” Saffron starts. “You don’t want to lead them, why do you let them follow?”

He doesn’t answer. He pushes back into the main chamber, looking down at the Hive runes drawn in the dirt.

“You could give the Vanguard their names, warn them. As soon as those weapons hit the Tower, it’s you they’ll look for.”

Rook kicks the dirt. “Let them.”

Then Saffron shakes indignantly, putting herself right in front of her Guardians face.

“Rook!” She all but explodes. It’s not the first time, Rook raises an eyebrow. “I spent years searching for you! I was by your side through every mistake, every trial you put yourself through! Why do you insist on throwing everything away?”

“Because you’re still here,” and the tone of his voice is all wrong, where the words call for regret or guilt all he does is seethe, his eyes angry slits. She doesn’t reply, the Ghost equivalent of a shocked blink shaking her shell. “So if you really care that much then just _get lost_.”

They stare each other down. A few seconds pass.

“I won’t give up on you.” Saffron says.

“Oh trust me, I know,” Rook replies. Then he grins, that same malicious thing he gave Avia. “But the feeling aint mutual.”

Rook walks away from the Ghost, back to the entrance of the cave.

“Oh, trust me,” Saffron says to the silence before she dematerialises. “I know.”

* * *

 Avia tosses and turns. Sleep has never come easy to her anyway, even at the persistence of her fireteam members. The worst part, she thinks bitterly as she hauls herself into a sitting position on her bed, is the fact that she knows what’s on her mind.

Ikora sent her the information she promised a few hours after her debrief. And Avia scoured through everything only an hour after that.

The Crucible clips play over and over in her head. That meeting in the EDZ, how it felt like his hand seared an imprint on her waist, on her wrist. His voice, telling her that they’re the same. His _damn_ eyes and crooked grin.

She makes a frustrated noise and throws her head into her hands. She looks over to her holopad, the clips still lined up, information embedded in one big folder. She berates herself. She shouldn’t do this. She saw what she needed to see. This would just be… Indulging herself. And the thought creeps its way up her skin and into her head and she makes another noise in the back of her throat as she grabs the holopad.

She skips through the videos available to her until she finds the one she’s thinking of. His first true kill. She presses play and watches, Rook advancing on a Titan, hand canon primed. Rook shoots, but the Titan doesn’t go down, and in a few more misplaced shots from the both of them it quickly turns into a fist fight. It’s desperate, angry, and Rook gets the upper hand, driving a knife into the Titans neck. As soon as the poor Guardians Ghost pops up, the knife gets pulled and stabbed into its unshielded eye. It spasms, terrified, and goes limp.

Avia rewinds the tape and watches Rook closely. She watches the way his chest rises and falls rapidly, how his head snaps to the Ghost so quickly and he moves as if piloted by something else. When the Ghost stops moving is when Rook’s breathing gets slower, and he lets go of the knife, watching the Ghost drop to the floor, the steel sticking out of it. Other Guardians approach him slowly, Shaxxs’ booming voice commanding a dead stop to the game. Rook scrambles for his helmet, pulling it off, his eyes wide and scared and nothing like how Avia has seen them in person.

He looks to the Guardians around him and back down to the one he just killed, the harsh green of the Hive architecture pouring twisted light onto his face. And the video ends there.

Ikora piled everything into a timeline for her, and there’s some audio files after the video; transmissions between Rook and Cayde, Shaxx, Lord Saladin. Avia skips over them to the next video, only a few months afterwards. From what she remembers of the other files, Cayde and Shaxx had deemed Rook okay to compete in the Crucible once more, a decision criticised by Zavala and Ikora.

The next video is a compilation, clips supposed to illustrate Rooks descent as far as the crucible goes. Thirty seconds or so of aggressive tactics, matches where Rook refuses to quit once the timer clocks down and takes pride in continuing to assault opposing Guardians. It’s not egotistical, like other Crucible champions Avia has heard of. He’s doing it for himself, she can tell in the way he carries himself, ignoring callouts from team members, avoiding any and all communication to achieve an ends.

An ends where all he wants to do is hurt someone.

She finds herself lying back down, propping the holopad up against a pillow. She’s still not tired per say, but the need to find comfort outweighs any embarrassment she harbours about what she’s doing.

The next video is another kill. This time, a kinderguardian, and highlighted throughout is the use of Rooks hand canon. She was right in thinking that he wasn’t using a replica Thorn, like she has, like so many Guardians do. But it carries itself similarly, a weapon bleeding dark energy and sending shrill bullets down long hallways, two hits being more than enough to take someone down. It’s Tex Mechanica, dubbed ‘First Curse’ from what everything else in the folder tells her.

This time, Rook doesn’t need to kill the Ghost. The game is rumble, and Avia can’t help but acknowledge how annoying the younger Hunter is. Throughout the game he gets more and more cocky, throwing insults Rooks way and developing a toxic attitude whenever someone takes him down.

Avia skips forward, remembering Rook stalking down a hallway after the Hunter. She stops when she finds it, the Hunter backing up rapidly, trying to reload a shotgun as fast as possible. Avia watches Rook stalk him like a predator, raising his hand canon and shooting the Hunter down. The Ghost pops up, stutters, and then falls down, lifeless. Rook puts another two bullets into the Guardian, and Shaxx once again calls the game to a stop.

Avia rewinds. She watches Rook closely, her eyes drawn to his gun. As he walks towards his kill, she notices the same effect she saw in the EDZ, his gun seething with darker energy, and as he gets closer it walks up his arm. It looks nothing like Thorn. It looks worse.

The clip ends. Her eyes feel heavier. She pushes onto the next clip, forgetting what exactly made the Vanguard so certain that Rook wouldn’t do this again.

The next is surveillance from the Cosmodrome. Rook on a patrol by the Hive seeder. Avia watches through her closing lids, the Hunter steering clear of the other Guardians who watch him wearily. She misses the space between, but eventually the Guardians thought it a good idea to approach him, to point at his gun.

The last thing Avia notices before she falls asleep is the tendrils from the hand canon curling lovingly towards Rook’s hand, before he takes it out and fires twice.

* * *

 “She’s from the Reef?”

The Human nods. Her scout rifle sits on her hip, her pride and joy. Rook noticed her teaching other Dredgens how to infuse their own, to the point where the lunar base they found him in is now littered in Hive runes. Rook hates it.

“How do you know? Wait, how does she know?”

“Supposedly she ran away,” the Hunter – Gail, as Rook has come to know her through her weapons and incessant company, tells him. “She doesn’t really talk about it, but according to some Guardians with keener ears than I, she’s one of the few who remembers who she was before she was revived.”

“And who was she?” Rook asks, lounging on a set of Fallen supply boxes, an arm resting on the knee of one leg propped up.

“Well, that’s the thing,” Gail says, arms crossed over her chest. Rook can’t tell what her opinion is of this favour he asked. She seems indifferent, which suits him. “Another Awoken said she looked familiar. When I asked why, she didn’t know. Just said she gave her a bad feeling.”

Rook hums.

“Another Guardian told me that when Petra Venj came to the Tower there was a fight between the two.”

“Petra who?”

“Venj. Queens Wrath.” Gail purses a lip. “She’s now the Awoken Queens Right Hand. At the time, she was a… Vendor. Quest giver. Asked the Guardians to hunt down enemies of the Queen.”

“They fought?”

Rook watches Gail wrack her brain, the same concentration he’s seen when she’s tinkering. “From what I could gather from people who were there, they were close before she died. They argued about that. Avia wanted nothing to do with her.”

“Close?”

Gail shrugs. “I don’t know at what capacity. Seemed personal enough for a screaming match across the plaza.”

Rook isn’t proud of the way his fist clenches.

“So she’s Awoken? Reef born?”

Gail nods, and Rook watches her smile, coy. “Pretty, too.”

“That right?”

Gail reaches into her back pocket, a small holopad expanding. Pictures flash across the screen, a woman with lilac skin and purple marks, bright blue eyes and violet hair pulled back on the top layer into a ponytail.

Something in his chest aches. He reaches over, Gail meeting him halfway with a smirk. He sits back and flicks through, Avia starting a crucible match, talking to the Cryptarch, laughing with Cayde. Seeing them next to each other pulls a frown to his face, and Gail laughs, a short thing.

“What.” He snaps, not looking up.

“If half the people here thought that a Golden Gun to the chest was enough to get your attention, you’d have more problems than just a crush on a Guardian.”

He stands, staring her down. She’s smart enough to look scared, a foot going backwards to create space between them.

A second passes. Then he extends the holopad, which she takes cautiously.

“Anything else?” He asks.

She puts the pad back into her pocket, swallowing under his gaze.

“She’s the one who killed the heart of the Vex in the Black Garden.”

“So she’s a hero?”

“Doesn’t act like one,” Gail adds. “Keeps to herself, mostly.”

“Got a fireteam?”

“Yeah. Human Titan, Exo Warlock.”

“Close?”

“Enough to run missions, not sure if it goes any deeper. She took on the Vex alone.”

Rook sits back down, reclining once again.

“You think she’s gonna come after you again?” Gail asks.

“She wasn’t coming after me. She was trying to save Cayde,” he replies. “But, I think soon enough your little weapons running around in the Tower is gonna rile up the Vanguard somethin’ fierce.”

Gail smiles, proud of herself. “And you think they’ll come after you? To stop us?”

“You’re on your own as far as all that Dredgen business goes.” He states.

Gail shakes her head. “They’ll come for you too.”

He smiles at her, crooked.

“Oh don’t you worry, I’m counting on it.”                  

* * *

Eden is in Crucible when she spots the first one, sparking the first instance of worry.

She creates a Ward of Dawn on point B of the Firebase Echo map and reloads her shotgun. She sees the Warlock on her radar, turning and readying herself, surprise filling her at the audacity of her opposition to slide right into her bubble.

Until the auto rifle rips through her shield in half a mag.

Eden splutters, backs up out of the bubble and shotgun the Warlock as they choose to push her, instead of taking the point.

Two shotgun shells ring out, but she’s at disadvantage. She goes down another clip later, the Warlock reloading with a steady ease and swaggering their way back to the point.

They lose the match, spectacularly so. Eden sees the Warlock in question, running up to their fireteam as the match comes to an end. Her eyes run over their clothing, down to the weapons on their hips. She’s seen Thorn replicas, plenty of them, but these are different. Outside of the hand canons, the Guardians are outfitted with a plethora of weapon types, an odd, sickly energy pulsating from them. They’ve been modified, outside of the watchful eye of the Vanguard or Banshee.

She never saw the man they called Dredgen Yor, but she was there to see his terror reign, heard whispers of a young Hunter taking his masters mantle to take the monster down.

It’s this vignette that prompts her; she collects the Guardians names and highlights their equipment. She sends everything over to Shaxx, hailing her message as nothing more than something for him to check out.

A couple of games later, she receives a message from Zavala, asking for her presence at the upmost urgency.

She pulls out of the Crucible and sets a course for the Tower.

She makes a light jog to the Hall of Guardians, information scattered in front of Zavala as she reaches him.

“Commander,” she greets, slightly breathless.

“What do you make of this?” He asks her. Not a trick question, as a slide of the Guardians she faced today flicks past them on a screen.

“Honestly? I’m sure it’s nothing but a few kinderguardians getting giddy at all the Thorn replicas. It’s just unfair, how powerful their weapons are. Which is why I sent it to Shaxx.”

“I wish that were true,” he starts. He brings up an image of a Guardian, a Warlock, setting down outside of a set of Golden Age buildings on the Moon. Eden’s eyes squint, it’s difficult without the helmet, but eventually she recognises the auto rifle, the darkened clothes.

“That’s–”

“One of the Guardians you faced in the Crucible today, from your report.” Zavala answers for her.

“I wouldn’t call it a report, Commander. I’m not sure I understand.”

Zavala hums. “I apologise,” he starts. “We’ve had troubling reports of Guardians infusing the Darkness into their weapons and using the Crucible to test them. Your report may have just confirmed our worries.”

“Testing weapons?” Eden asks.

“When we last saw weapons like this in the Crucible, it was swiftly followed by an exile.”

Eden mulls his comment over, not sure how much the Titan Vanguard expects her to know that isn’t just the Towers gossip, especially concerning this topic. “That – the Hunter. His hand canon, right?”

“Precisely.” Zavala says. Eden feels something curl in her gut. “His name is Rook – a former Hunter. We believe he may be following in the same footsteps as Yor.”

“Yes, you sent Avia on a mission to rescue Cayde from him,” she says. Zavala takes the statement casually, looking at her.

“I did.”

“She’s been filing through the information you sent on him non-stop. If there’s a mission you need undertaking concerning them, would she not be a better fit?”

“He isn’t the subject of this mission,” Zavala states. “Avia seems more interested in preventing him from hurting anyone else, and as it stands he’s not an active threat. What I would ask of you is different.”

Eden watches Zavala flip through the images until a region of the Moon becomes highlighted. An old Colony base, some kind of tourist destination for Clovis Bray.

“Cayde has informed us that a group of Guardians who tangle with the Darkness is forming, we believe being led by him. They give themselves new names – Dredgen.”

Eden nods, remembering their dark dress. Then she casts her gaze down and asks; “how is Cayde?”

Zavala smiles, sadly. “A complete menace, as far as the hospital staff are concerned. They asked if I could give them clearance to keep him chained to the bed.”

Eden laughs at the image, not putting it past the good civilians in the hospital to make good on that request regardless.

Zavala, that string he normally has through his demeanour seemingly less taught at the mention of Cayde, refers back to the Moon base. “We believe here is their newest base, according to Ikora’s Hidden.”

“I’m not much of a scout,” Eden says, weary. “You know that.”

“We don’t need a scout,” Zavala says. “We need someone who might be able to talk some sense into these Guardians.”

Eden’s taken aback, placing a steady hand on the table. “You want me to reason with them?”

“In a sense. I don’t know how much they’ll listen to you, but maybe if we extend on olive branch first, offer them a way back to the Traveler, they’ll heed your words.” Zavala’s mouth thins into a line. “Now. What they did to Cayde was atrocious. So I can understand if you have your reservations.”

Eden takes a breath, then looks at the rolling pictures in front of them.

“I thought them wound up in the revived myth, wanting to forge their own Thorns. This seems different. I can’t promise I’ll succeed.”

Zavala nods. “There will be no shame in it. Truly. If so, be sure to remind them that the Vanguard has their eye on them. Their next decisions will shape our next moves, if that is against them, then we won’t hesitate.”

Eden nods.

“Send me the coordinates,” she asks softly. “I’m going to speak to Avia, see if there’s any insight on this Rook that might help with the Dredgens.”

Zavala taps at his screen, his expression turning to something soft. “Do as you see fit, and alert us when you go.”

* * *

“You’re going to _what?_ ”

“Avia,” Eden frowns. “Don’t be like that.”

“Be like what?” Absolutely incredulous at the fact that Zavala isn’t going in fists swinging for once?” Avia grips her holopad, fingers nearly going white, feet dangling off the side of her bed. “Can you blame me?”

From her seated position across from her Hunter teammate, Eden tuts. “I’ll have you know Titans are remarkably good at negotiating when they want to be. Remind me to tell you about the Dark Ages, not every meeting with a War Lord ended in a fight, you know.”

Avia smiles slightly as she scoffs, raising a cheeky eyebrow in response.

Eden rolls her eyes and looks around at Avia’s unkempt room, her curtained windows and messy sheets. “When was the last time you slept?” She asks, not unkindly.

Avia ruffles, looking back down to the pad in her hands, scrolling through an audio transcript. “I don’t sleep, you know that.”

Eden stands and yanks the pad out of her hands. Avia’s mouth drops open like a scolded toddler, and Eden holds the pad up as she swipes for it desperately.

“That was really edgy of you, you know that? Should I be worried?”

“Give it!” Avia stands, and Eden takes a step back, turning her back to Avia who tries to grab the pad around the Titans massive armour.

Eden observes the different files, flicking through as many as she can whilst Avia tries to interfere. Certain videos are paused at specific times, files having been opened as recently as twenty or thirty minutes ago.

“How much of this is there to go through?” Eden asks, concern laced in her voice.

“I – there’s – enough.” Avia splutters.

Eden faces her again, her grip going slack as Avia swipes the pad back from her.

“There’s enough,” she repeats sternly. “Enough to know how he fights, what provokes him, which you might need.”

“Zavala doesn’t think he’s an active threat.”

“Oh, I guess he thought that when he sent me into the EDZ too. Shame Rook didn’t.”

“Rook?” Eden frowns. Avia catches herself, the realisation rippling through her.

“That’s his name, yes.”

Eden sighs, and Avia bristles, flinging herself into fight or flight mode. A hand through her lilac hair, pulling the sleeves of her borrowed jumper over her hands. “Look, Eden, don’t–”

“How long have you been looking at all this? Since you met him? Avia, that was weeks ago now.”

“I – does it matter?” Avia asks, her tone sharp. “Ikora sent me it. Zavala signed it off.”

“You know that’s not why I ask.”

Avia huffs once more. “When Scarlet is up to her neck in research, you’re never like this.”

“When Scarlet is researching, she doesn’t stick to one folder of resources,” Eden counters to Avia’s pout. “She also doesn’t do the majority of her ‘research’ in her room. What’s going on?”

Avia diverts her attention, her eyes suddenly oh so interested in the pile of armour in the corner of her room.

“It’s nothing,” she says, small. “I just… Almost didn’t save Cayde. That’s it.”

Unease washes over Eden at Avia’s answer. The same unease she felt when that Warlock attacked her with a tainted gun, when Zavala requested her presence in the wake of what she thought would be nothing but a warning; a heads up.

She doesn’t want to call Avia a liar. So she just smiles sadly at the Hunter, and places a hand on her shoulder, squeezing.

“I’m going to approach these Dredgens tomorrow,” she tells Avia, her voice as comforting as she can make it. “Anything you think I should know?”

Avia smiles then, and it reaches her eyes, bringing Eden some semblance of calm.

* * *

“Gail?”

She whips her head up from where she’s sitting, the tainted glow of the Hive runes around her overpowering the stark white lights above. Her sandy blonde hair sits neatly in a bow atop her head as she scribbles on wayward pages, scattered pieces of several guns with different names attached to them in a pile by her feet.

“Yes?”

A Warlock walks in, removes his helmet. An Exo face, dinted irrevocably so on the left side. If Gail remembers correctly, this is the one that let Cayde go free.

“I think your weapons have been spotted.”

Her smile is lopsided and viscous. “About time.”

“Should we leave?”

She hums, not listening, but her mind catches the request and she frowns. “I’m not quite sure why you’re asking _me_ that.”

“Are you kidding?” He asks, voice terse. She pierces him with a quizzical look. “Rook’s not gonna tell us to leave.”

“Rook only ever tells us to leave,” Gail says, tone deadpan. “The only important thing is whether or not they know where we are. So, the better question is, do you think they’ve found us?”

The Warlock shifts on his feet, back and forth. “There’s a chance,” he speaks, sheepish. “It won’t be long before they do.”

She rolls her eyes and looks back down at her pages as she says; “We’re not the ones who are afraid of their own shadow. Remember that.”

The Warlock huffs, walking off, and Gail sits still for a moment in the silence.

Her hand skims a schematic for a hand canon. Her chest seethes in envy, it’ll _never_ be Rook’s. She can’t even get close enough to look at the runes on his own, to see the way the frame is twisted and corrupted beyond belief.

She knows, assuredly better than the other clueless Dredgens, that he’ll never lead them. But she doesn’t need him to.


	2. The Scorpion and the Frog

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sat, trapped, between the green corrupted light of the Hive, sits Eden. Gail recognises her from Avia’s fireteam immediately, and something satisfactory twists in her gut. She bears purple bruises on her face, one eye nearly swollen shut. Gail looks up and sure enough, there sits a Ghost in a smaller trap, the piece of crystal hovering above it, keeping it comatose, swinging from the ceiling.
> 
> Avia will come for her, there’s no doubt in Gail’s mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> confession time - i had this chapter already written out when i posted the first and wanted it to be a christmas surprise, so. surprise! 
> 
> hope everyone is having a lovely day <3

_[u.1:2.7] Who the hell you think you are?_

_[u.2:2.4] According to your facts, "nobody." Yet, here I sit._

_[u.1:2.8] Don't matter much how pretty yer cannon is. You keep it up, we'll see just how loud you like to get._

_[silence]_

_[u.1:2.9] You done talkin' now? Guess he knows his place, boys._

_[u.2:2.5] Ever have a nightmare?_

_[u.1:3.0] You playin' games? Or just thick?_

_[u.2:2.6] I know you have. This world? Can't help, but._

_[u.1:3.1] I don't have nightmares. I give 'em._

_[u.2:2.7] You are a goddamn cliché. The picture perfect bandit._

_[u.2:2.8] Hearing your voice - the things you're saying, the shade of the hard man you pretend to be..._

_[u.1:3.2] Ain't no shade._

_[audible crack]_

_[audible crack]_

_[audible crack]_

_[silence]_

_[u.2:2.8] Sit down._

_[silence]_

_[u.2:3.0] Sit. Down._

_[u.2:3.1] Your mouth just got your friends dead._

_[u.2:3.2] This is what happens when you bore me. And right now..._

_[u.2:3.3] I'm so very bored._

_\- Ghost Fragment, Thorn 2_

* * *

  _She walks through the European Dead Zone._

_Except the trees are black and decaying, rotted from the inside out, as hollow as an old tooth._

_She places her hand on the trunk of one and watches it vanish within like pushing into water._

_She pulls it back and her hand ignites, gasoline catching fire, solar flames licking and curling all the way to her elbow._

_They twist and tithe to her, pulling and froing and tugging on the Light, as though making sure it’s still there._

_A hand on her chin pulls her gaze up and there Rook stands, his eyes black._

_He grins and pulls her hand to his chest._

_It rests solid in the middle of his armour, and the Light within her and along her arm s c r e a m s._

_Avia feels herself watch with a morbid fascination, so interested in this ruination that no protest comes from her._

_The light turns into a sickly green, sharp and biting into her, attacking her, hungry, so hungry._

_Jagged edges pierce her skin over and o v e r and o_

_v e_

_r_

_She’s hungry._

_She clasps onto the collar of his chest plate and sinks her teeth into the skin under his jaw._

_She feels the puncture through her body, mouth filling with liquid, jagged edges keening in delight._

_Hungry, hungry, so hungry—_

_A hand rests on her head pushing her closer._

_She wakes._

With a gasp, Avia sits bolt upright in bed and sucks air into her lungs.

She tastes copper on her tongue and frowns, wiping her mouth. She pulls her hand away and on her lilac finger tips is blood. She bit her tongue in her sleep, the pain making itself known is sharp and she swipes it along the rest of her teeth, more blood cloying there.

She puts her hand back down onto the bed and it hits something. Looking down, the holopad is half obscured by her bed sheets. She pulls the sheet back carefully, and there yet another of Rook’s Crucible clips plays.

She groans and throws the pad across the room.

“Avia…” Levi starts. “Another nightmare?”

“I know I was being dramatic,” Avia says from between where she rests her hands on her forehead, “but this is _why_ I don’t sleep.”

Levi pushes through her hands, an affectionate gesture. She smiles small, looking at the little Light.

“It might be time to give this up,” she says.

“I would agree.” Levi says.

She sighs, melancholy, watching the holopad on the other side of the room intently. She moves to pick it up, and as she throws the sheet off her body it makes a noise. She stops midway, knee in the air, as Levi whirls their shell to collect the message she just received.

“Oh.” They start. “Oh, no.”

“Levi?” Avia asks, settling herself back down.

“You’re not going to like this.” The Ghost starts.

* * *

Levi was being very kind to Avia when all they said was that she ‘wouldn’t like this.’

After twenty minutes of hurriedly pulling armour on, cursing loudly and generally ignoring all of Levi’s advice to try and stay calm, Avia runs into the Hall of Guardians, by passing a worried Ikora, ignoring the call of her name.

She slams her hands down next to Zavala, seething, and the Titan Commander regards her audacity with a stone face. It softens upon remembering why she’s here.

“When.”

“A few hours ago, her Ghost went silent in the same way Cayde’s did,” Zavala answers, and Avia only then notices that the Hunter Vanguard still hasn’t returned to his post. “Given Cayde’s after action report, we know now what happened to it, which means these Dredgens must have kidnapped her too.”

“Where is she?” Avia asks, no time for rage, no time for how could this happen again, no time for if I see that excuse for an exile, I can’t promise I’ll come back. “Tell me.”

Zavala looks like he’s going to argue, to slow Avia down and brief her in a proper sense. But he locks eyes with Ikora in that quiet way that gets under Avia’s skin. He shows her coordinates on the Moon, Avia’s eyes registering only a set of buildings and the flight path, before she storms back out of the hall.

Zavala yells her name, Ikora following suit but she listens to only the blood rushing in her ears and the metal in her mouth as she calls for her ship and makes for orbit as quick as she can.

* * *

Gail hears the commotion as she rounds the corner, shotgun in hand for one of the Dredgens.

No wonder it took her so long to find anyone, she thinks, seeing them all huddled around an alcove down the middle of one corridor.

“Hey!” She yells into the fray. A couple of them turn to look at her, and she catches the eye of a Warlock and shouts again; “Jaaldrin!” Shaking the shotgun in the air as a beckoning.

As the Awoken runs up to her, she looks over his shoulder, seeing the energy of her Hive trap climb tall above their heads. Another Guardian who strayed too far, she supposes. At least Rook will have something to do.

“Gail, anyone ever told you you’re a wizard when it comes to this stuff?” Jaaldrin smiles, shark like, his blue hands turning the shotgun over as he stares at it in awe.

“Save me the niceties and hand over the Glimmer,” she says. He frowns, but summons his Ghost to do so, and Gail nods her head over his shoulder. “Another Guardian?”

“Yeah. Trying to talk us back to the Tower,” he scoffs. Gail raises an eyebrow, prompting a further explanation. “Human Titan, saying that the Vanguard have their eye on us and we should consider returning to the Light.”

“’Returning to the Light’?” Gail repeats.

“Yeah,” Jaaldrin places the shotgun on his back, looking back as some of the Dredgens lose interest and move away. “She’s not going anywhere. You think Rook’s gonna let her get far?”

Gail shrugs. She makes to take one last look at the poor soul, but a shock of snow white hair stops her. She pushes around Jaaldrin to get closer, following her curiosity, a handful of Dredgens still taking in their catch.

Sat, trapped, between the green corrupted light of the Hive, sits Eden. Gail recognises her from Avia’s fireteam immediately, and something satisfactory twists in her gut. She bears purple bruises on her face, one eye nearly swollen shut. Gail looks up and sure enough, there sits a Ghost in a smaller trap, the piece of crystal hovering above it, keeping it comatose, swinging from the ceiling.

Avia will come for her, there’s no doubt in Gail’s mind.

Eden looks up through the magic bars, her eyes still wide and solemn.

“Should we tell Rook?” Someone says. Gail tuts.

“Or,” she turns to the Dredgens, a mixture of confusion and curiosity on their faces. Jaaldrin has re-joined the group, regarding Gail closely. “She tried to talk us into going back to the Light, right? Maybe she should stick around, see what the Dark is really like.”

It works, embarrassingly well. The Dredgens mutter between themselves but eventually agree, casting their last smug looks into the trap as they disperse.

Gail catches Jaaldrins eye. His arms are crossed over his chest, white eyes piercing her. “What’s your play, Hunter?”

Gail shrugs again. She casts one more look at Eden, who murmurs; “You’ve fallen so far.”

“Friend,” Gail starts, kneeling down, smiling. “There’s farther to go.”

* * *

Avia moves silent through the building. The familiar square architecture of the Moon bases is corridor after corridor, some lighting her way, some sparking and damaged after centuries of abandonment.

She doesn’t regret not sticking around to hear Zavala’s mission briefing, but a part of her wishes that she knew what happened to Eden’s Ghost, at least to know why Levi can’t detect it. It burns a frustrating temperature in her skin, not knowing Eden’s location, having to call upon her Reef training lest she wander aimlessly in search for her fireteam member. It hurts enough to remember, without having to think about what might happen if she doesn’t at least use it properly.

So she scours, keeps herself low to the ground and listens for any wayward movement or signs of life before she rounds corner after corner in her search. All she knows is that she’s pushing inward, but what was a simple and smooth pathway has now turned into a relentless maze; the true inner workings of whatever this building used to be in the Golden Age.

A patch of Hive runes leads to a faulty piece of weaponry, down the ways is a recent scuff mark on a wall. She feels she’s making progress until she shimmies through an air vent and finds sketchings on the wall, the exact same ones in the exact same place. Her anger she keeps quiet, taking a breath, trying to push the marred metal of Cayde’s face out of her mind.

“These runes are the same as some nearby, I can detect it in the Hive magic,” Levi tells her. “I thought it was just general markings from the Moon, but maybe it’s worth checking out?”

Avia nods, clenching her fists and trying to calm herself. Hands shaking, Levi silently places it on her radar. It’s behind them, making her loathe to follow it. Feeling she has no other choice, she turns on her heel.

Closer to the main entrance of the building, Avia kneels once more as they approach the coordinates. Levi takes in her chattering body, her iron grip on a wayward pipe, and floats to see what they picked up.

“There’s a Hive trap up ahead.” They say.

“A Hive trap?” Avia asks, wondering at the depravity of these Dredgens. Levi doesn’t answer, she looks up to find him floating there, staring. “Levi?”

“She’s trapped inside it. Her Ghost is in one too.”

Avia pops up, readying Thorn, and Levi blocks her vision with a quick slice through the air.

“Wait!” They say with an accompanying pulse of their shell. “You need to be careful, if those Dredgens hear you, they could overpower you both.”

“I’d like to see them try.”

Avia keeps one hand on the wall, but down the hall – a breath away – she sees her. Eden, curled up under a Hive trap tucked away into an alcove, her Ghost hanging, hauntingly asleep, above her. The fury in her chest rises as she picks up the pace, her footfalls as soft as she can manage.

When she reaches her, Avia drops to her knees, the sound making Eden raise her head, a look of faint annoyance and exhaustion on her face. The Human widens her eyes when she sees Avia, crawling onto her knees, wary of the moving bars between them.

“Avia?”

“I’m here,” she says, relief coursing through her. “It’s me.”

Levi wastes no time in scanning the trap, flying up to address Eden’s Ghost also. Avia looks over the trap herself, her mind cast back to that terrifying nightmare, keeping her hands by her side until Levi tells her how to break the spell.

“It’s draining her Light,” Levi tells them.

Eden still lets a smile creep to her lips. “Well, that explains why I feel like a Dreg,” her joke is lost in the way her normally towering form shakes, her gauntlets ripped and dented. Her skin is as white as her hair, her lips dry and cracked and Avia wants to break whoever did this to her, the thought ripping through her violently.

“This is Hive magic unlike any I’ve seen before.” Levi states. “It’s been…Adapted, almost. Studied and understood and repurposed not only for trapping but for _draining_. If we take the crystal at the top, it should break the spell.”

Avia nods, and wanting nothing more than to reach in and give Eden whatever comfort she can before they make their escape, instead she asks softly; “Can you run?”

“Run? Yes,” Eden says. “Fight, maybe not. Angel has my weapons, but I can feel the toll this has taken on her too. Even if you free her…”

Eden casts a look up at her Ghost sadly. Avia follows the gaze.

“Better stay close to me then, yeah?” Avia says and then stands.

“Take the crystal,” Eden adds. “So we know what this is.”

Avia nods. She reaches over the trap, her body angled awkwardly. The neon green bounces off of her gauntlets and her stomach turns at the image, like a water reflection. Slowly, she inches closer, and closer.

Her fingertips bracing the crystal, a voice shouts; “Stop!”

Not looking behind her, Avia grabs the crystal and pulls. The trap breaks with a familiar Hive shriek.

“Levi!”

“Got it!” The Ghost grabs the crystal, Angel falling into Eden’s open hands.

Avia turns and throws a knife at the Dredgen who spotted her. It hits the Warlock in the shoulder, stuttering his run towards them and he pulls it out, grabbing a shotgun from his hip. He’s too far away for the spray to cut deep, so Avia takes the brunt of the blasts with an arm across her face, metal slicing across her armour. When the Warlock runs out of shells, she reaches down for Thorn, firing two blasts and watching the Dredgen writhe as the poison depletes his shield.  

He takes a step, determined, but hits the ground. It doesn’t escape Avia’s notice that his Ghost still appears above his body.

“We have to move,” Avia says, reaching down and pulling Eden up by her elbow. The Titan leans on Avia, who takes the brunt of her weight.

“Angel needs to get to the Light, and fast.” Levi says, and Avia looks down at the Ghost in Eden’s hands, twitching, the light of its eye flickering, fighting.

Eden places Angel on her hip and says to Avia; “I’ll follow your lead.”

Avia nods, turning and holding Thorn in front of her as they walk down the corridor, Avia keeping the pace closer to a run. At each corner she checks for Dredgens, perhaps not as sharp as before with the curling dread in her gut, the need to get Eden out of here as fast as possible.

Eventually they push into a huge main chamber, circular, a door across from them. Avia grabs Edens hand and jogs to it, noticing how Eden nearly trips over her own feet more than once. As they get closer they see the disrepair the door is in; electricity sparking out of the sides, the bottom out of sync with the latching to keep it in place.

Avia tries to pull at the slightly open wedge on the side, Levi scanning it rapidly. Suddenly they hear a commotion, two heads and a Ghost whipping back down the corridor they just traversed.

“How many?” Avia asks.

“Five,” Levi responds. “I could fix the door, but–”

Avia looks around, a grand entrance on their right is locked, no doubt an even tougher time for Levi. A glass window on the left holds promise, but Avia isn’t sure that Eden has the strength to get through it quickly enough, let alone help break it.

“We don’t have time.” Avia decides, as the Dredgens come piling into the room.

There’s a beat of silence. 

Avia should do the smart thing. She should stand and defend, convince these Dredgens to let them go. She should at least stall so Levi can work on _something_ , so Eden doesn’t have to exert herself. But at the thought of her teammate, her friend, her sister through the worst of Avia’s time finding her feet in the Tower – her bruised face and small, smallest demeanour Avia has ever seen locked away in that trap, the solar light under her skin burns into an inferno.

She summons her Golden Gun.

It takes three of them down with a familiar flick of her wrist, their corpses burning into fragments. The other two scramble, firing and in the fray Eden turns back to the door and starts to pull, Levi trying to mend it at the same time.

Avia stalks forward, taking a running shot at a Hunter who ducks her first bullet. He pulls a knife out of his belt and tries to disarm Avia when they’re face to face, but she grabs the wrist and twists. The Hunter kicks at Avia’s kneecap and she goes down with the motion, trying to pull the Hunter over her head. She wins the grapple, and he ends up on the ground. Avia pulls the knife from his hand and throws it with deadly precision and a guttural yell at the Titan trying to revive one of the Dredgens Avia turned into a bonfire.

It sinks to the hilt in the back of the Titans neck. As they splutter and reach blindly for it, Avia twists the wrist beneath her more, lifting her leg up and stamping on the chest of the Hunter.

She hears a loud groaning of metal, and breaks the wrist in her hands before letting go and running back to Eden.

Levi dematerialises as they push through the gap, Avia ushering Eden first. They run in earnest then, distant chattering and yelling behind them, and Avia notices Eden’s slowing pace.

They arc into a crossroad of hallways, and Eden careens to the side, next to an emergency exit onto the Moon’s surface, locked. She puts a hand on the wall, dropping to her knees.

“Avia,” Eden says. “You have to go.”

“Not happening.” She kneels down next to the Titan. “We’re so close Eden, we have to keep going.”

“Avia–”

“No.” She snaps. With a huff, she takes off her helmet, looking at Eden, truly looking at her. “Stop wasting your energy trying to argue with me and _get on your feet_.”

Before Eden can answer, the Dredgens catch up, the hallways bigger than Avia realised as she squares them up. She stands and faces them, the two of them not even taking up the breadth of the space and it gives Avia some hope, at the very least.

“You shouldn’t have come here!” The Titan yells.

Avia rolls her eyes in response, reloading Thorn and taking her shots.

The Titan runs forward, giving the Hunter a chance to ready a sniper rifle. Avia spots it and chucks a grenade, arcing high over the Dredgen advancing her, who she then shoots at steadily taking a few steps forward. The armour seems to absorb Thorn’s poison, so Avia braces herself for the Titans collision, scraping backwards a couple of feet when they hit.

When they stop the Titan rears a fist back, Avia taking the punch but grabbing the forearm, using the momentum to swing around onto his back. She tries to grapple his neck, but he throws her off easily enough, grabbing her arms and swinging her away, her body scraping across the metal floor. She hits a wall with a grunt, a sniper slug sinking into her wrist.

With a yell through her teeth, she looks back down at the Hunter and from the floor manages to deplete his shield with Thorn. She’s not fast enough for the Titan though, who picks her up and chucks her back to where Eden is.

This time she tumbles and rolls, stopping on her stomach.

“They’re here!” The Titan shouts, and though Avia’s muscles protest the motion, she gets onto her knees as more Dredgens join the two in the middle.

The Dredgens, various weapons either raised or clasped tightly at their sides, make their way slowly towards them. Levi starts to heal Avia without making themselves known, but it does nothing to stop the dread in her stomach. There’s more of them than she anticipated.

“Do you surrender?” The Titan asks, and Avia laughs.

“Is it a requirement to have a flair for the dramatic to join this club?” She asks, derisive.

The Titan reaches down and picks her up by her cloak, and it’s only when she’s raised in the air that Avia realises Thorn must have slipped from her grasp when she was thrown. The constriction on her throat causes her to cough and splutter. Avia kicks her feet, snarling as the Dredgens around them enjoy the display. 

“Is that a yes?” She gets out.

“You’ve got a smart mouth,” the Titan says. “I’d like to send you out there and hunt you down myself.”

“You need brains for hunting, I’m afraid.”

The Titan slams her down, the wind getting knocked out of her chest, head smacking off of the floor. Eden gasps as Avia rides the wave of anger that takes her over, kicking and pulling away, the pain behind her eyes throbbing. He kneels down over her and raises a fist, the other Dredgens rising in noise and egging on their own.

A shot rings the air, denting the ceiling and it crescendos familiarity in Avia’s chest.

She goes still, as does the Titan above her. Silence falls. The Titan stands quickly, backing up away from her, and she coughs and splutters getting her breath back. Eden crawls over to her, helping her into a sitting position. Avia puts her forearms behind her, bracing, as Rook kneels down to her eye level.

“You startin’ ta make a habit of this?” He asks, an easy going smile on his lips.

Avia sneers back, her head still pounding. “Trust me. I wasn’t planning on it.”

Rook tuts. He looks at Eden, making Avia cast a look at her too. She meets Rook’s eyes with a ferocity Avia seldom sees.

“And I take it you’re the one running errands for the Vanguard, that right?”

“You’ve made your point,” Eden starts, voice strong and sure. “You all have. There’s no sense in keeping us here. Let us go.”

The Dredgens shift, unsure. Rook thins his mouth, seemingly considering her words. Then he laughs, a smile on his lips as he speaks.

“Not sure what ‘point’ you mean. All I see is two Guardians who listened to the wrong order and don’t wanna face the consequences.”

“I’m surprised you’d know anything about consequences.” Eden spits.

Avia sees the way his shoulders shift, the squint in his eyes. Before he can follow the movement to Eden, Avia pulls herself up and closer to him.

“Get on with it.” A breath away, she doesn’t miss the way he revels in how close they are, the glint in his eye. “If you’re going to kill us, then just do it.”

The room tenses. Avia ignores how the thrumming in her head has cascaded down to her chest, tries not to think of Rooks eyes as black as the night and that space underneath his chin.

Rook stands.

“How about a trade?” He says, loud enough for the room.

Avia looks around. They’re outnumbered, she still doesn’t know where Thorn is, and Angel twitches, the little sounds flicking against Eden’s battered armour.

When Avia says nothing, Rook goes on; “One Guardian for another?” He asks, rhetorical. “I’ll let the Titan go, but you gotta stick around for a while.”

“’Stick around for a while’?” Avia snaps back, incredulous. “So what? You can stick me in that trap?”

“You _broke_ that trap, sugar. Difference is, you’re staying with me. No one else is gonna lay a hand on you.”

The statement ripples over the Dredgens, and it lays a claim on Avia that she’s not sure how to deal with. They all stare at each other, and then back to her.

“Or,” he goes on again, shrugging his shoulders. “I could just walk away, and we’ll see what happens then.”

Avia waits. She feels everyone’s eyes on her, seeping down into her bones, but none burn her more than Rook’s in that moment.

“Deal.”

“Absolutely not–” Eden splutters. She grabs Avia’s shoulder, and the Hunter turns, takes her hands in her own and squeezes tight.

“Nah, you heard her Titan,” Rook says. “Deals a deal.”

“Please, Eden, just go,” Avia begs. “I’ll be fine, I promise.”

“He’ll hurt you,” Eden says. Avia hears a click behind her, and suddenly two of the Dredgens are moving. “I won’t leave you here.”

“You’re in more trouble than I am right now, trust me. Please Eden, please, _please_ just go.”

Eden’s eyes are wide and unrelenting, and she shakes when she’s picked up. When she’s on her feet she shakes off the Dredgens, Avia rising to her own and silently pleading to whatever – the Light, the Traveler, hell even the Dark – that Eden does as Rook wants.

There’s a second, Edens chest rising and falling rapidly.

“If you lay a hand on her, Guardian killer, it won’t take _an order_ for me to hunt you down.”

“Don’t you worry,” Rook replies, and Avia didn’t even notice him sneak up behind her. “I’m the perfect gentleman.”

Eden bristles. Avia takes a shaky step forward, ignoring the heat on her back.

“Please,” her voice cracks. “Please, Eden.”

With tears in her eyes, the Titan nods. She places a hand on Avia’s shoulder as she passes, the two Dredgens following her.

“She leaves alive,” Rook calls after them. “If I hear differently there’ll be hell to pay.”

Avia feels her chest collapse. She heaves, a long breath in and out, and feels Rook turn to address his crowd.

“Well, looks like the Vanguard found you again,” he sneers. “Better get out of here before more overzealous Titans come.”

No one moves.

Rook shoots the floor this time, the unholy shrill sparking the Dredgens to scatter. Avia can’t help but chuckle bitterly, anticipating this time Rook sliding up to her back again.

“Did you _expect_ to have your very own drooling acolytes when you went on a killing spree?” Her voice is watery, laced in heartache. Rook moves around her, a shark smelling blood. When he looks at her, his mouth is set into a frown, almost remorseful. He holds her gaze so fiercely that she looks away, giving herself this one loss. He reaches a hand up and brushes a tear away from her face and before he speaks she sees it; the dark blue material of her own gauntlet wrapped around the neckline of his cloak.

“I didn’t tell them to hurt her.”

“ _Liar_ ,” Avia spits.

“Listen sweetheart, I didn’t even know she was here until one of them had the brains to clue me into the fact that _you_ were messing them all up.”

She shoves his chest. He has the good grace of going with the motion, even if it only separates them a couple of centimetres.

“You’re a liar,” she grits again. “You’re a liar and a murderer and all you do is hurt good people.”

“Oh come on now. That’s what I’d expect from a Traveler worshipping Guardian. But we both know that aint you, don’t we?”

She sniffs and wipes her eyes angrily. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“Wager I know more than you think,” he bites his bottom lip, settling his hands on his waistband. “I aint gonna keep you long. Just long enough to chat.”

Avia blinks, disbelief settling deep into her features. “I – you’re – chat?”

He has the audacity to smile at her, and she ignores the betraying twist of her chest. “Chat, darlin. Wish we’d have met differently, you know.”

Her chest aches at his words, silencing any comment she might have.

“That’s it then?” She asks. “All that because you just wanted to chat?”

His smirk is wide, his tone laced in familiarity. “If I’m being honest, there’s more I’d like to do. But it’s like I said, I’m a gentleman. Don’t reckon you’re in the mood after seeing your friend beat up.”

“Hah,” she laughs dryly. “It’s a bit of a mood killer, if I’m being honest.”

“I’ll bear that in mind.” His tone equally as dry, and he nods his head behind her; a _come with me_ motion and starts to walk in that direction.

She follows him, staying side by side. They hear the Dredgens scurrying around, none of them looking Rook in the eye as they walk past. They cast her curious enough glances, and the memory of the Reef kicks up again in her brain, so overwhelming she starts to shake.

She keeps her head down, and he wastes no time finding them somewhere. A sliding door wedged on its side blocks the way, Rook moving forward and pulling it up for her, waving his other hand in a polite gesture, if not for show. She rolls her eyes and moves under, the creaking and groaning of the door hitting the ground behind her.

Avia looks around the room as Rook walks past her. He takes a relaxed seat on a set of benches beneath an arching display of bay windows showing off the lunar surface. It’s a sort of lounge room, where perhaps Humans would come to sit and gaze at the solar system behind the glass. Rook looks as if he’s lived here for years, legs spread, an arm thrown across the back of the seats.

“So?” Avia asks. He smirks.

“Ask away, darlin’.”

She frowns. “What?”

He chuckles then. “From what I hear you’re not a Guardian who appreciates not getting the whole scope of things. And I don’t imagine the Vanguard paint me in the nicest of colours, so. Ask away.”

She hesitates.

“No catch,” he assures her, then his mouth turns sour as his gaze is drawn to the window. “Reckon you’ve had enough of that today.”

“Okay,” she starts, fire brimming under the surface. “Fine. I’ve got a question. Is this–” she gestures at him “—supposed to change anything?”

He shrugs. “Suppose not.”

She takes a few steps forward.

“Is there any reason I shouldn’t put a bullet in you right now?”

“Not really,” and his smirk is drawn up one side, lazy as anything. “Take a step back, sugar. Think about this.”

Loathe to take his advice, she does. She doesn’t take her eyes off him as she thinks, and breathes, and feels herself calm down. She asks herself, does she trust him? Maybe. She pushes away the implications of that, not wanting to dwell on how they make her feel. He’s too easy going, too sure in his ways, not… Scheming, enough, Avia would say, for this to feel like bait. Or a trap.

She has an opportunity to get at least the other side of the story – how many Guardians would be able to say that, considering how hard it was for her to even garner information on the man sat so leisurely before her. She can worry about the truth later, she decides.

“Why did you kidnap Cayde?”

Rook scoffs, then laughs, a small mean thing.

“I didn’t,” he says. “Cayde came looking for me, trying to talk me back to the Tower. Made it sound real convincing, like he could talk Zavala, Ikora and the Speaker out of exiling me just like _that_.” He clicks his fingers.

Avia remembers Levi’s off comments about Cayde’s report. It softens something in her.

“He meant a lot to you.”

“I meant a lot to him.” Rook corrects. “He had a lot riding on me when they let me back into the Crucible. Didn’t pan out well. Guess he blames himself

“So, what? You chased him away?”

“Similar to what happened to your friend, I suppose. He found some Dredgens, they didn’t like what he had to say. They’re the ones that threw him in that trap, I heard him out but left him to them.”

“Until he got out?”

Rook nods.

“You were going to kill him, in the forest.”

He shrugs again. “Kind of my thing.”

“He knew you,” Avia recalls, not only Cayde’s words in the forest but the pieces of what he told her afterwards. “He said you didn’t want to be this. The way you talk to those Dredgens, everything I’ve heard about you versus you just sitting here. Is he right?”

Rook’s mouth thins into a line. He rests his elbows on his knees, his hands dangling in front of him.

“Bit too late for a question like that.”

“That’s not an answer.” Avia cuts back, arms crossing over her chest.

He laughs, a breath through his nose. “He’s wrong about me. Always has been, always will be.”

“Why? Why do you think that?”

Rook pierces her with a look, his turn to be confused. “Why do you care?”

She shrugs, revelling in the quizzical way he looks at her. “Suppose I don’t.”

“You’re full of surprises sugar,” he leans back again. “Tell you what. I’ll answer that little tidbit, hand over heart honestly and all that, if I get to pick _your_ brain for a little while.”

She ruffles slightly. “I’m not telling you anything about the Tower.”

“I don’t care about them,” he says, his voice tilting just so. “Just want to get to know you.”

“You love making deals, don’t you?” Her voice carries none of the confidence she wishes it did.

“Come on sweetheart, at least let me have this,” he says, tone laced in jest. “Whaddya say?”

A creeping feeling tells her to bend to him. To fall and trust so easily, but she pushes it out of sight and answers.

“Ask away.”

His smile is crooked, his question quick, falling off his tongue with ease. “Why’d you leave the Reef?”

 Her blood runs cold.

“How did you know about that?”

“Darlin’, that’s not the deal.”

Avia curls her fists, looking down to the floor. Trying to conjure the words, she starts slowly.

“I was a member of the guard. I was close enough to the Queen to have a high position in her court. As the years went on, I lost sight of what I was fighting for. In fact, I didn’t even know what that was. I didn’t see us protecting the Queen, I saw us as weapons for her disposal, fighting battles against foes that never challenged us first. I didn’t–” _know who I was_ , she wants to say, but she screws her eyes shut and searches for anything else. “—want any part of whatever wars she would wage to assert herself. And when my questions were accused as treason, I ran away. I had to.”

Rook hums. Avia doesn’t look up at him.

“You kill people, then?”

His implication twists her, that scathing voice insisting that they’re the same. “I was considered an assassin, for some time. I didn’t kill because I wanted to.”

“But because she told you to?”

Avia nods, not trusting her voice. She ignores the way Thorn preens at her side in her peripheral, that hollow chamber brimming with Darkness mirroring the one on Rook’s own hip.

“How’d your Ghost find you?”

The tears threaten to come back as she remembers, white hot flames and pain unlike anything she’s ever felt.

“I died. Stole a ship and made for Earth. I was chased by two Corsairs and they shot out my engines just as I broke the atmosphere. He found me a few hours later.”

Rook breathes in, a quiet understanding. “Tough way to go, sweetheart.”

She turns, wipes the tears again. Silence falls, and she hears Rook stand.

“Cayde’s right,” he starts, walking towards her. “In a way. This isn’t what I want, certainly isn’t what I expected.”

She turns on him, glancing a look over her shoulder to see him behind her. “Then why? Why do you stay?”

“Cause there’s nothing there for me anymore,” he says, small and reverent. “I spent a lot of time thinking I was just trying to justify my exile, finding any excuse and that’s the one I settled on. More I thought about it, more true it felt. I didn’t wanna fight for the Traveler. I didn’t want to fight for a humanity I didn’t know, that didn’t feel like mine.”

“And how did you justify murdering people? After being brought back from the dead?”

The question almost smacks him in the face, and she stands her ground at his confusion.

“The first was an accident, true as I’m looking at you right now,” his voice is small. “They pushed me back in too early. I got cocky, felt invincible. Took a while to get even a slap on the wrist.”

Avia files that last comment away for the Vanguard, however; “Still, you made that choice.” She challenges.

“True. Hindsight’s a funny thing sugar, you’d know about that. I’d make that choice again if I had to, if it meant less time being told where to point and shoot with only half the truth to go on. I just didn’t know it when it happened, ya know?”

She thinks of Zavala, of Ikora’s sad glare, her hands gentle atop Avia’s own and Eden’s bruised face. Reef patrols and sneaking into the hangar and having so many regrets up until a little white robot floated in front of her face and called her a Guardian.

Her next question tumbles from her lips; “Then why do you stay?”

Rook’s brow furrows before he catches on. “What?” A thumb in the general direction of the rest of the base. “With them?”

Avia nods. He shrugs his shoulders; “Exile gets lonely.”

“That’s not it,” she bites. “You’re not stupid, you know what they want from you. But you can’t stand them, I can see it all over your face.”

Rook sways onto his front foot, lazy and cheeky with a scathing smile and Avia would shove his shoulder if she didn’t think it would send a message, one too casual for the string pulled taught between them.

“Well, feel free to look at this face all you want sweetheart.”

“Answer the question.” She demands, and Rook laughs.

“Well. Truth is, they found me. Haven’t been able to shake them since.”

“How?”

 “I, uh.” He stops, inner thoughts cross over his eyes but he seems to make a decision just as sharply. “Got to roaming further and further from the City after I got kicked out. Settled down in a couple of self-made towns, the types you hear Saladin talking about from the Dark Ages. Settled aint the right word, but. I walked and talked, passed through some. And then I just… Got bored.”

His shift is slight. But Avia sees it, in the shadow over his face, the sadistic twist of his grin. The hunter, the stalker from the Crucible videos comes to mind, and the realisation is followed by a chill down her spine.

“Hell of a feeling, to go from high and mighty Guardian duties day in, day out, to sitting in some bar feeling people staring, trying to tell that voice in the back of your head to can it.”

Avia stays silent.

“It got too much. I was just waiting to snap, at that point. Just wishing for someone to give me a reason,” he puts a hand on his face in thought, scratching the stubble on his chin. “Guess I wasn’t far enough away from the Tower at the time. They still got word.”

“Word?” Avia asks, her voice betraying her nerves. “They were still tracking you?”

“No, sweetheart,” he starts, his voice soft. “They only sent Guardians after me when I started killing folks in the village.”

The surprise careens into a sick, vile sensation in her stomach, legs wobbling as though she’s started to drown. _Idiot_ , she chides herself. _Stupid, stupid Avia. What were you expecting?_

Rook goes on, unfazed. “Didn’t take much in the end, I guess. Couple of guys saying I didn’t look much like a Guardian, not believing me when I said I wasn’t. They got cocky, I got angry, and that little scratch in my head… Well. After that, I guess they sent the wrong Guardians to give me that slap on the wrist, cause they were more interested in how I killed them than telling me to quit it.”

“And then what?” Avia sneers. “You asked them to stick around?”

“Didn’t need to. They kept finding me. They still do,” he says, a hint of frustration to his tone. “Guess it aint all bad, though. They make their little weapons, I show ‘em how to not get killed by them.” He moves forward just an inch and Avia, though she hates herself for it, moves backwards. He keeps going as he speaks.

“Some Guardians get bold. Think they can track me down and put an end to the ‘next Dredgen Yor.’ That’s how it started, I guess. Guardians in over their heads, and these ones like dragging them back and messing around with them.” A laugh, hoarse and empty. “Guess some of them are just as sick as I am, cause they’ll wear them down, let them go, then I get to scratch that itch.”

Her back hits a wall. He raises an eyebrow. She scowls as the pieces line up; “Cayde.”

“Bingo, sweet thing.”

She shoves him, but he only crowds down over her on the rebound. “They were gonna do the same to Eden. Treat her like a goddamn animal.”

“It’s like I said, sugar,” a hand rests on the wall by her head. “I didn’t tell them to hurt Cayde, or your friend. Never do.”

“But you could tell them to stop.”

His laugh is a short, sarcastic thing. “Yeah. Vanguard did the same thing for me. Imagine the Queen did the same for you. Didn’t work out for us, did it?”

Her next shove is hard, putting her whole weight behind it. She reaches down and plucks Thorn from her belt, raising it at his chest.

“We are _not_ the same.” She spits.

He looks down at Thorn, wry, and back up to her. He puts his hand on her wrist and she watches, the seething Darkness curling around his fingers, enveloping her hand.

Her mouth tastes like copper, his hand feeling as though it’s tugging on her as he says; “Now. Where’d you find that?”

Frustration like a knife burrows into her chest, a finger around the trigger but then she remembers. The hand canon between them was lost when she was fighting that Titan. She didn’t think to look for it as Rook took her away. And yet there it was on her hip, as if it belonged, as if it made its way there by itself.

She grabs the hand holding her viciously, and his other hand snaps to her. Hands on wrists, a writhing mess of tugging and twisting until Rook forces the gun to the ground with a clatter. He pulls her close, mouth next to her ear.

“Maybe we aint the same,” he seethes. “But there’s something in you that doesn’t believe them, and you can kick and scream and call it wrong all you want, but it isn’t going anywhere.”

“I’m not a killer,” she spits, pulling back as hard as she can. He lets her go and she stumbles, hitting the wall again.

He looks at her, sadly. His earlier comment runs through her mind; _wish we’d met differently_.

“Find me, sugar. If you change your mind.”

He turns and walks away. Against the wall, Avia’s chest rises and falls. Her eyes fill to the brim with tears, Levi bringing her ship around and nuzzling themselves into her shoulder.

“He’s wrong.” They say.

She looks down, knowing already that Thorn won’t be on the ground. Her hand finds it on her hip and she sucks in a breath, casting a final glance at where Rook walked away before she appears in her ship, feeling heavier with each step to the pilot’s seat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> also concerning that dream at the beginning dont @ me okay i know its dramatic just let the 14 year old emo child wanna be creature of the night in me have this okay o k a y

**Author's Note:**

> ive also been a tad ill, so apologies for any mistakes or anything like that! hope everyone has a restful christmas and a good new year <3


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